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Fire is seen from a Sûreté du Québec helicopter Saturday, July 6, 2014 following a train derailment the sparked several explosions in Lac Megantic, Que. (THE CANADIAN PRESS)

Blocks of downtown Lac Megantic, Que., were flattened after oil tankers derailed and exploded in the heart of town early Saturday. At least one person is confirmed dead. (Paul Chiasson / THE CANADIAN PRESS)

LAC-MÉGANTIC, QUE.—First, First, Bernard Théberge heard the now haunting rattle of an approaching train. Then he felt the ground shake.

But it wasn’t until the driverless freight train, laden with tankers of volatile crude oil, hurtled off the track that he instantly perceived the danger he was in.

Théberge saw and felt the enormous ball of fire rolling towards the Musi-Café in this picturesque lakeside town, where he and the other patrons were enjoying a beautiful summer’s night on the patio.

“It was like an apocalyptic vision,” said Théberge, 44, who suffered burns to his right arm.

He and others on the patio fled. They were lucky.

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On Saturday afternoon police confirmed the death of one person in the derailment and the subsequent explosions that shot flames hundreds of metres into the air and laid waste to downtown Lac-Mégantic.

However, by late evening, Lt. Guy Lapointe of the Quebec provincial police, was saying authorities “do expect there will be more people found deceased.”

The fireball and shock wave from the explosion destroyed 30 buildings and homes, gutted downtown businesses and left dozens of people — possibly as many as 60 — unaccounted for in this town of about 6,000 people, east of Sherbrooke.

Hundreds of people had to scramble for safety, fleeing the intense heat as the towering flames lit up the night sky.

Théberge, who works at the Musi-Café, said he knows three of the missing people: fellow employees who haven’t responded to repeated telephone calls. While he and his pals escaped, those inside the restaurant may have been trapped in an inferno.

The restaurant, beside the railway tracks that pass right through the heart of downtown, is emerging in eyewitness accounts as ground zero of the deadly explosion.

Yannick Gagne, owner of the Musi-Café, said he too is unable to contact some employees.

Gagne told a radio station he left the restaurant about 20 minutes before the first explosion and he could feel the heat of the flames a kilometre away at his home.

Theberge hopped on his bicycle and got to what he thought was a safe distance away — until the heat from an explosion, one of five between the 1 a.m. derailment and 4:30 a.m., scorched his arm. He said there was nothing he and other patrons could do to help those who hadn’t fled with them.

Witnesses said the town centre, where there are many popular bars, was crowded when the train flew off the rails just after 1 a.m.

The initial blast was so intense that Roger Beauchesne, who was outside his house two kilometres from downtown, said he had to take cover behind his car to protect himself from the heat.

Beauchesne said the municipal library, which is beside the railway tracks, was among the buildings demolished by the blasts, along with Dollarama and the Metro grocery. Late Saturday firefighters assisted by specialists from Ultramar were still battling persistent fires, burning despite a steady drizzle.

The cause of the accident is itself turning out to be stranger than fiction. According to the railway’s operator, the derailed train was a runaway.

Edward Burkhardt, chief executive of Rail World, the parent company of Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway, said the 73-car train was parked uphill of Lac-Megantic after the engineer had finished his run. Somehow it headed into town without a driver.

“If brakes aren’t properly applied on a train, it’s going to run away,” said Burkhardt. “But we think the brakes were properly applied on this train.”

“We’ve had a very good safety record for these 10 years,” he said. “Well, I think we’ve blown it here.”

The 10-year-old railway owns more than 800 kilometres of track serving Quebec, New Brunswick, Maine and Vermont.

Joseph McGonigle, a railway vice-president, told the Montreal Gazette the conductor stopped the train outside town just before midnight and locked the brakes, ensuring that all the cars were secured. He then checked into a Lac-Mégantic hotel for the night.

“Sometime after, the train got loose,” said McGonigle. “It travelled under its own inertia to the centre of the town.”

He said there are security mechanisms to prevent tampering with the train, and the conductor had done the proper checks before leaving the train for the night. The conductor, he said, should have been the only one who could set the train in motion.

“We’re not sure what happened, but the engineer did everything by the book. He had parked the train and was waiting for his relief ... somehow, the train got released,” McGonigle told Reuters.

“That’s what confuses us. How did this happen? There are many fail-safe modes. How this happened is just beyond us.”

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is looking for the black box to confirm the direction and speed of the train. And the provincial police said they are considering a possible criminal investigation.

Lt. Lapointe said officers are collecting eyewitness accounts as well as photos and videos from cellphones.

They are also looking into a report that a blaze had started before the train derailed in the town. The Nantes fire department, a short drive from town, confirmed last night that it had received a call sometime before midnight about a locomotive fire.

“I’m just saying it’s one of the possibilities,” Lapointe said Saturday night.

Billowing smoke continued to fill the sky Saturday afternoon.

“We can still see a lot of black smoke and lots of firefighters. This is so saddening to see,” said Leonard Bedard, 80, who lives about a kilometre away. “They should never allow trains carrying that much oil to pass through towns. It makes absolutely no sense, and it makes me angry.”

Bedard said that is “mostly businesses destroyed, but about 30 to 40 houses as well. I hope they rebuild.”

Worried residents watched from behind the perimeters set up by authorities, sick with fear that some of their friends and loved ones may have died.

“We’re told some people are missing but they may just be out of town or on vacation,” provincial police Lt. Michel Brunet told reporters. “We’re checking all that. So I can’t tell you at the moment whether there are any victims or people who are injured.”

Bernard Demers, who owns a restaurant in town, had to be evacuated from his home.

“Early this morning (there was) a big explosion like an atomic bomb,” he said. “It was very hot. ... Everybody was afraid.”

He said the downtown area was bustling as the train hurtled in.

“On a beautiful evening like this with the bar, there were a lot of people there. It was a big explosion. It’s a catastrophe. It’s terrible for the population.”

Demers, who has lived in Lac-Mégantic for 45 years, describes it as a “nice town.”

“Everybody is very friendly ... It’s like a small village, a beautiful town. But now it won’t be the same.”

A Facebook group was quickly set up to help people track down loved ones who couldn’t be reached by phone.

About 450 of the evacuated residents are staying at Polyvalente Montignac, a local school, where 20 volunteers from the Red Cross are helping out.

“For now we’re helping them get settled in, providing food and beds, as well as helping them getting in touch with loved ones,” said Red Cross spokeswoman Myriam Marotte. “We will continue to assist as long as the authorities want us to.”

Beauchesne said there were 160 firefighters on the scene and there’s a “team spirit” in the town and “everyone is working together.”

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who was attending the Calgary Stampede, expressed his concern on Twitter.

“Thoughts & prayers are with those impacted in Lac-Mégantic,” he tweeted. “Horrible news.”

In a statement later, the prime minister added: “We hope evacuees can return to their homes safely and quickly. The people of Lac-Mégantic and surrounding areas can rest assured that our government is monitoring the situation and we stand by ready to provide any assistance requested by the province.”

Meanwhile, some counted their blessings that they were not downtown Friday night.

Frédérique Mailloux was supposed to meet up with six friends at the Musi-Café to see a popular local singer. Instead, it was one of the rare occasions she decided to skip a night out.

“I don’t smoke, so I would have been inside (the restaurant),” she said. “When you think of that, you are relieved.”

That night, at home in a neighbouring village, her 12-year-old son came into her room to say he could see red and orange lights on the wall. She hopped in her car to get to the scene but was stopped by emergency personnel.

On Saturday she sat outside a work-skills centre safely away from the still burning downtown and watched a little boy emerge from the building choking back tears.

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